Science fiction has always indicated that it is a matter of when—not if—some kind of Apocalypse will occur. When it does, what will happen to the organisms that inhabit Planet Earth? Will humans revert to some type of proto-human? Will they “rise” to the occasion and create something better? Will the strong survive, only to subjugate the weak? Will we come together as human beings to build new civilizations, or devolve as a species competing for scant resources in an environment inhospitable to our very existence? Science fiction has long explored the means and outcomes of apocalyptic cataclysms, and scholars have likewise expended considerable time and energy considering the artistic, cultural, and intellectual responses to the worst possible catastrophes the human mind can devise.

Michael G. Cornelius and Sherry Ginn are proposing a new collection of essays specifically to examine various televisual treatments of the Apocalypse. We are particularly interested in the serialization of the end of the world. The Apocalypse, after all, is an event, a singular happening with a cause, an outcome, and a response. Yet the nature of television prolongs some or all of these aspects of the end. Television allows for an extended examination of this singular (and singularly defining) event. What has this extended observation indicated about humanity? How does the nature of the Apocalypse alter when we revisit it week after week? What does it mean when the end of the world might never actually end?

Below you can find a suggested listing of series that we would like to see discussed. This list is by no means exhaustive, and we welcome essays on any series that meets the post-Apocalyptic theme in some capacity or another. We are hoping for works that reflect the storied variety of series that have depicted some version of the Apocalypse on television, not simply those that are currently on the air. The editors plan on accepting only one essay per series (though we will also look at essays that tackle the subject matter more broadly as well). Please send a 500-word abstract and CV by the deadline indicated below.

The deadline for formal proposals is 1 August 2017, with notification of acceptance by 10 September. A first draft is expected by 1 January 2018 with final drafts due 1 June 2018. The collection is to be published by Lexington Books (a subsidiary of Rowman & Littlefield).

Please email DoctorGinn@gmail.com with your proposals and any questions you may have concerning the project.